2026 has been probably one of the busiest and travel heavy years on record for me, though most of it was based on family vacations and weekend trips. However this year, the family vacation and The Midwest Gaming Classic overlapped which had me going from New Hampshire to Wisconsin to South Carolina and back to NH in a weeks time and that ended up just being the start!
The latest trip however was to Retro World Expo that took place in Hartford, CT back in September and was an absolute blast in so many ways! Getting to be a featured guest of the show was humbling and putting us right in the middle of the convention made our booth hard to miss. The video above shows my recount of the weekend, but one of the coolest things that has happened this year isn’t just about my perspective, but those of the attendees and how many impressions they’ve made of my/our projects.
And by this, in particular, I mean the amount of coverage said projects have received from a variety of You Tubers and other social media influencers in the Retro Gaming fields. While it’s always cool finding yourself in the background of someone’s game hunting video or things like that, these past 2 years of MGC and RWX have had us front and center to some of the biggest Retro Tech creators out there and it’s mind-blowing to me to see the response they receive!
So, just so I could get a feel for the scope of how much other creators have supported Downing’s Basement (and by extension, BitBuilt) through their content, I’ve compiled a list of embedded videos by creator, that have directly showcased a project of mine at MGC 24, 25 & 26 as well as RWX 25 & 26.
I’ll include time stamps if you wish to skip ahead on some of the longer form videos, but I do highly recommend giving these videos a watch and help support the creators as much as possible!
And I know it is difficult to actually quantify how much of an impact some of these actually made, especially with some being over 30 minutes into a video, it still means a lot to me that they made it there to begin with and will always be counted as a win to me!
John Riggs
Lazy Game Reviews – 33:07 & 12:39
Macho Nacho – 10:15
RAD Junk – 2:27
Russ Lyman – 21:27
Retro Rick
Ray Out There – 41:35
And I’m sure if I looked, I’d find several others, but this is just a taste of the kind of stuff that keeps me in love with this hobby and all the people in it! Though I wouldn’t mind if 2027 was a bit less hectic, we’ve got some very cool momentum that I doubt is going to slow down any time soon! So stay excited people! We’ve got a lot more to come!
